


Sweet Tooth (4:45am)

by parkneroses



Series: No Sleep In Quarantine [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Light Angst, M/M, Mention of Canonical Character Death, fighting through toxic masculinity, harley's dad sucks in the pfu (parkeroses fanfic universe), i just really like commas okay, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-11
Updated: 2020-05-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:14:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24121918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/parkneroses/pseuds/parkneroses
Summary: A tale of enhanced senses, bittersweet memories and the importance of being who you want to be. Or who you’re supposed to be. Possibly both, or maybe neither, Harley hasn’t quite figured it out yet.
Relationships: Harley Keener/Peter Parker
Series: No Sleep In Quarantine [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1740487
Comments: 2
Kudos: 37





	Sweet Tooth (4:45am)

Soft, gentle streams of sunlight enter through the window so slowly that they would be imperceptible if not for the unmistakable sound of the city slowly waking up.

Peter wonders what it’s like to feel drunk.

Surely this is close enough, his thoughts appearing and then disappearing just as quickly, no time to think or consider why, just fleeting wisps of “what if?” with no trace of understanding. It almost hurts, with how much he’s used to being the smartest person in the room, how much he’s used to knowing everything. It almost hurts not knowing how, or why this is happening. But it doesn’t.

Harley pushes the door open with his elbow, a steaming mug of coffee in each hand. One, plain black, fills the room with the sharp scent of freshly ground arabica beans. To Peter, it smells like the long nights he spent comforting May after Ben’s death. It smells like last minute cramming for exams that are too important for that to be a viable tactic. It smells like stress and anger and regret and Harley, it smells like Harley after a late night engineering binge, like the final push of effort it takes to finish a project, like the flannels smothering his nose as he sniffles his way through the aftermath of a nightmare, the earthy scent and strong arms around him grounding him until the memories become memories once again.

To Harley, it smells like coffee should smell.

Harley makes his way to the bed. Peter rubs the sleep from his eyes before propping himself up on his elbows and taking the second mug. Now that it’s closer, the sweet, hearty aroma of chocolate and honey make themselves known as they filter through the air around their heads. Harley doesn’t understand the need for coffee to taste like dessert, but that’s okay. He doesn’t need to know. It’s not important. Harley refuses to even try it, which is strange because he has the biggest sweet tooth out of everyone Peter knows.

Harley’s scared he’ll like it more. He can’t deny he enjoys making new sugary concoctions for Peter every morning, and he is well aware that they probably taste a hell of a lot better than the bitter solution he makes for himself. But he knows in his heart that there are some things he can’t have. He’s happy that Peter is happy with his nice sweet fancy coffee, but that’s not the coffee a man drinks. And god, what Harley wouldn’t do to just not be a goddamn man. But there are rules, rules that he was never any good at following, because he doesn’t care for arbitrary limits in his life. How he wishes he could just do things because they make him happy, give his all to everything and everyone around him, treat things with care and tenderness. How he wishes he could be gentle, lovely.

But those are things that girls are supposed to be, and that’s stupid and sexist and Harley doesn’t believe in rules like that and he believes in doing what you want because you can, but his dad told him he has to be a man and his dad isn’t there anymore and what kind of shitty son would he be if he didn’t obey his dad’s wishes? Half of his genes came from his dad, he is half his dad, he doesn’t get to choose who he is. He is Harley Keener, and he drinks his coffee black.

Peter’s eyes trail around Harley as they sit in silence. They’re both thinking, obviously. Harley is looking down at his hands, away from Peter, eye contact would break him right now. It’s getting harder and harder to be who he’s supposed to be, the constant stream of love and support in his life affords constant opportunity to become who he’s becoming, and that’s not what he wants, not who he’s supposed to be.

He knows there’s an easy way to make it stop. Sometimes he thinks he could maybe just do it, tell Peter they’re not meant to be, spit out those venomous lies like he means them because he’s supposed to. He shouldn’t care if Peter cries, and he can’t cry himself.

But he will care and he will cry because he is flawed and he can’t stop thinking about the nights he’s spent learning about Peter, learning all of him, touching him because the light looked pretty on him, and the dust danced in the air the way his heart did in his chest, and he dreamed of kissing Peter in the moonlight, and he remembered how they held each other close those times they had nothing else to do, regardless of the time of day or other responsibilities.

He thinks about every other romantic cliché, and surely his father is turning over in his metaphorical grave, because this is all wrong and Harley is so happy, so so happy and his nose is filled with scent of sugar and orange, orange because he’s so close to Peter now and he can feel those caramel curls tickling his chin, and Peter’s lean arms wrapping themselves around his waist, pulling him closer, and he smells like orange, and his eyes are so completely glazed over, he’s so absorbed in his senses he probably hasn’t even noticed the thud, thud, thud of Harley’s heart in his chest or the tears fighting to escape his tight eyes. They’re so perfect together, there’s something so wrong with them. They were meant to be.

**Author's Note:**

> So this was kind of personal and not at all like most of my works? If you liked this, I have a ficlet called "pink" that's got the same vibe but a happier ending, and if you hated this I have a whole host of much happier funny fics you can find on my page :)
> 
> This came to be because I couldn't sleep and I was sick of not writing, (I can't believe this is my first fic of the year, it's MAY) so I put my 1,500 liked songs on spotify on shuffle, and wrote something about the first one that came up. Sweet Tooth by Cavetown is far happier than whatever this is, in all honesty.
> 
> Find me on tumblr @parkneroses if you wanna have a chat! Now drink some water and take your meds. Please. For me.


End file.
